As You Wish
by Fernandidilly-yo
Summary: "How can you not have a corkscrew?" Stephanie asks as she finally pulls the plug out with a slick 'pop'. "I'm seventeen," Tim says in way of answer.


**I meant to have this up back when I posted 'Catch Me When I Fall', but um, oops? ¯\\(°_o)/¯**

 **Anydoodles, here are some shenanigans with one Batgirl and former Boy Wonder.**

 **Disclaimer; These characters belong to people that don't appreciate them enough.**

 **Warnings; Underaged Drinking.**

* * *

 **As You Wish**

Tim jolts awake to the sound of someone slipping in through his bedroom window, -grabbing a Bat-erang from under his mattress and staring at the glass for a moment- is more a subconscious reaction than anything else, trained into the teen from years of being a vigilante.

But after a moment Tim lowers the weapon because he has a pretty good idea of _who_ must be sneaking into his Perch in the middle of the night. And that leaves the teen wondering _which_ one of his older brothers it will be this time, and then he is left trying to decide which one he is _hoping_ for it to be in the end.

Because both Jason and Dick are horrible house guests, and Tim was actually _sleeping_ in a _bed_ for once and they had woken him. Which was ridiculous, because Tim had finally given them both a key to his place so that they would _stop_ climbing through his windows like a bunch of creepers in the middle of the night.

Tim flicks on his bedside table lamp, but instead of a head of short black hair, he sees a puffy head of blonde wisps. _Which he had not been expecting_.

"Stephanie?" he slurs out, still half asleep, and now _very_ confused.

"Ever the detective," she says with a wink, sliding in fully and shutting the window behind her with a wet ' _shleek_ '. She's dressed in civvies, ripped jeans and a striped sweater, but she has a backpack on, indicating that she just finished up her own patrol.

"How'd you get past my security?" Tim can't help but ask, not that he _minds_ Steph being here, it would just be surprising if she managed to get past all his coding and boobytraps by herself, tech is _not_ Stephanie's forte.

"Babs," she shrugs one shoulder, coming over to plop herself on the end of Tim's bed, jostling him a little in the process.

Tim scrunches his nose, "no fair," he begins, "using Oracle is _cheating_." Though that does make sense, Barbara is the one that helped Tim with his security system in the first place, she probably knows it better than Tim does at this point, with all the improvements she has made.

Stephanie lays down on her back, her body arched in an odd way as she lies on top of her bulging backpack. She gestures wide to the ceiling as she says, "all's fair in love and war."

Tim huffs a laugh, "why are you here Steph?" he asks, wincing at how the words may sound, _foot meet mouth_ , and backtracking a moment later, "you haven't visited in a while." Better, not good, but _better_.

The blonde eyes him for a moment, "I didn't think you'd actually be _sleeping_ ," she says, sounding scandalized as she pokes at the bottom of Tim's foot in mock annoyance. "I figured you'd be on you fortieth cup of coffee about to keel over from exhaustion or heart failure, whichever comes first."

Tim smiles unbidden. "That was _yesterday_ , Tam cut off my caffeine supply this afternoon and told me she'd either drug me or rat me out to Alfred if I didn't get a solid _six hours_ tonight." And Tim believes her, Tam is not to be messed with or ignored.

Steph laughs, the sound clean and playful, reminding Tim of a different time. When there weren't all of these walls in-between them; when things had been simpler; he's always loved Stephanie's laugh.

"Ah, sounds like my kind of girl, I should hang out with her more," Stephanie hums.

Tim shakes his head, "no, no you should _not_ ," he says, "you two would be the end of me, plotting and conniving, you'd send me straight into an early and well-deserved grave."

Stephanie smiles wide as she wiggles her fingers together in a fairly good impression of a classic villain. "All the more rewarding," she mock whispers. Chuckling as Tim gives her an unimpressed look.

Tim rubs a hand down his face, blinking a few times and biting back a smile. He's missed Steph, just getting to hang out with her and pretend that the world is okay, that they are just two normal kids, that none of their many responsibilities exists, for just a few hours at least, a respite, a break.

Those visits used to be what kept Tim sane, what kept him balanced and feeling human, but now, without those shared nights of letting himself just be Tim (not a hero, not Timothy Drake, or a Wayne) just _Tim_ , well, the teenager isn't really sure he _hasn't_ lost it at this point, it would be more surprising if he hadn't honestly.

"Okay, okay," Tim says, stretching his arms over his head to get a few kinks in his back. "I'm awake, what are we doing?"

Stephanie sits up and slips off her backpack, letting it fall onto the bed before she pulls out a bottle of white wine in answer, waggling her eyebrows at Tim wildly as she displays the bottle to him with a smirk. "Drinking ourselves into a stupor, that's what," she says before going back to dig through her bag.

Tim blinks at the alcohol, feeling his lips scrunch, Tim isn't much of a drinker, one reason- being that it is always mandatory to be on high alert, and willingly taking substances that lower your inhibitions is a really stupid idea, especially when Tim is always on the watch for Ra's and his minions. And reason number two- being that he is _seventeen_ and it is very illegal for Tim to consume alcohol.

"What's the occasion?" Tim asks, eyeing the bottle and the pretty blonde holding it.

"Rough week," Stephanie says, puncturing her sentence by pulling out another bottle "very rough week," she finishes as she hands it to Tim.

Tim takes the bottle a bit reluctantly, biting his lip as he thinks out his decision. "We're seventeen Steph," he says, rolling the cold glass between his palms in contemplation, some of the condensation getting on his fingers and making his skin tacky and wet.

Stephanie rolls her blue-green eyes, mouthing something suspiciously like _'lord above'_ to herself before she says, " _you're_ seventeen wonder boy, I'm _eighteen_ , and as of now we aren't in Gotham, we're in Paris, and in _Paris_ , it's legal for an eighteen-year-old to drink."

Tim huffs a laugh, "do I want to know how you got two bottles of wine Ms. Brown?" he asks in his best French accent.

Steph takes that as her cue to slide off the bed and head to the kitchen, toeing off her beat up sneakers as she goes. "Your little heart couldn't take it, my dear Timothy," she replies, doing a much better accent than Tim.

Tim rolls out of bed with a huff, glad that he wore sweats in place of his usual briefs. The teen slips on a sweatshirt and picks up his designated bottle of Chardonnay as he makes his way into the kitchen, finding that Stephanie has flipped on his lamp, shadowing the room in blue, and is digging the cork of the wine bottle out with a _Bat-erang_ of all things.

"How can you not have a corkscrew?" she asks as she finally pulls the plug out with a slick ' _pop_ '.

Tim strolls over and takes the Bat-erang from her, working on his own bottle as he huffs, "I'm _seventeen_ ," by way of answer.

Which earns Tim a smack to the back of the head as he pulls the cork out, spilling a little of the sticky wine onto the edge of his hoodie sleeve. Tim frowns at the wet fabric for a moment.

"I can't see it," Stephanie begins as she walks into Tim's living room, "but I can clearly feel your judgey face," she spins around and takes a sip of her bottle, forgoing the idea of glasses, giving Tim something between a glare and a pout, "wipe it off."

Tim sets his bottle on the counter so he can bring both hands up in a placating gesture, "not judging," he says, "no judgment here."

Steph rolls her eyes as she plops herself onto Tim's couch, looking like an out of place starfish as she spreads out to encompass as much of the cushions as she possibly can, huffing out a breath as she says, "well alright, get over here then, boy Romeo, we have some catching up to do."

* * *

Somehow the two teens end up on Tim's living room floor, their backs pressed to the couch, their shoulders brushing against each other as they giggle and sip on the remnants of their wine.

Tim and Steph are both apparently _horrible_ _lightweights_ and it shows in the way Tim feels warm inside, his fingers tingley, and his head seeming emptier and lighter than it has in months, maybe years.

Tim isn't the biggest wine guy, that's Steph and Barbara. He isn't that big into beer either, that's Jason, and sometimes, Dick.

Tim always liked it when he was able to sneak a sip of his dad's scotch, the way it burned on the way down and left his chest on fire, his insides numb and singed; but this was good too, it didn't feel like Tim was punishing himself, didn't feel like he was paying for his bad choices as he made them. This left his mouth sweet and slightly tangy, left him somewhere in-between giddy and floaty.

"What would you do," Tim begins, happy with the fact that even though he is very much buzzed and getting closer to drunk by the minute, that his speech does not slur, "if you were really in Paris?" he can't help but ask.

Stephanie pauses, her bottle half way to her pink lips. She lets her arm fall back to her lap, the contents of her bottle sloshing inside with the jostling. She blinks up at Tim's ceiling for a moment as she thinks the question over. "I'd grab Cass, and then we'd eat our weight in cheese and fancy pastries."

Tim blinks at that, now wanting something from the bakery down the road, something with chocolate, _no no!_ strawberries, he would _kill_ for some strawberries right now. But its nearing 3:00am and Tim doesn't really feel like leaving the floor, plus the bakery is probably closed...

"You wouldn't take me?" he asks, going for teasing, but a little of the hurt slips into his voice unbidden.

Stephanie shrugs, knocking her head into Tim's lightly. Her hair smells like brown sugar, it's the same scent she's always used, it makes Tim feel a little nostalgic inside. Remembering times spent on swing sets, of eggplant purple, and soft slightly chapped lips pressed against his own.

"Nah," Steph murmurs, "Cass is the best."

And Tim doesn't say anything in protest to that, because yes. Yes, Cass _is_ the best. However, he does say, "could I come with you _and_ Cass?"

Stephanie doesn't even pretend to consider, just says "no _p_ e," popping the P on the end and everything, the tease.

Feeling slightly offended Tim scrunched his nose, taking a swig of his bottle and saying, "not even in this _hypothetical scenario_ am I allowed to come with you and Cassandra?"

Stephanie gives him this odd look, licking her lips before she says, "fine." Tim is pretty sure she is mentally rolling her eyes at him. "In a _'hypothetical scenario,'_ you can come be awesome with me and Cass." At this she jabs a finger into Tim's face, nearly poking him in the eye. "But you gotta remove the stick from your butt first."

Tim barks a surprised laugh despite himself, tipping over as he chuckles, "'as you wish'," in a soft voice.

 _"'Farmboy'!"_ Stephanie quotes, letting herself fall onto her back, her hair puddling under her as she gestures over exaggerated and loudly to the ceiling, " 'fill these pitchers up with water for me. _Farmboy!_ Shine my horse's saddle, I want to see my face shining in it by morning. _Farmboy'_!"

Every time she says, 'farmboy' she shouts the words; so loudly Tim knows it would wake his neighbors if he had any. _"'Farmboy this, and farmboy that'!"_ She says in her most demanding voice before abruptly cutting off.

Tim falls next to Stephanie on the floor, his head nearly landing on her shoulder with a clumsiness that comes with the haze of alcohol. "'She was amazed to discover that when he said, _'as you wish'_ what he really meant was'-"

Stephanie joins in then, the two both quoting, _"'I love you'_." In unison.

The teenager's cackle then, maybe a little bit too childishly, a little bit too carefree for what this situation calls for, but no one else is here except for Steph, and so Tim doesn't find it in himself to care about what 'should', and settles for what 'is'.

They lay like that for who knows how long, the room shadowed in the faint glow of blue, mouths tasting like sticky wine and breaths mixing with little giggles and tiny huffs of laughter.

It's quiet, quieter than it should be in Gotham City, and maybe that would worry sober Tim, but sober Tim left half a wine bottle ago, and drunk Tim relishes in the lack of noise, taking in deep and filling breaths that fill up his lungs to the brim before he starts the process over again, _one, two, three, four, five, six,_ he counts mentally, holds it for three, and lets it back out.

Feeling content in the smell of Stephanie's shampoo, the sensation of her hair under his neck and the top of her head brushing against his own as they lay on the floor tangled together in something too sloppy to call a real embrace.

They are _so close_ , closer than they've allowed themselves to be since- well… Tim hasn't let himself contemplate when the last time he was this close to Stephanie was. He just knows that it's been long enough that this feeling of intimacy almost comes off as foreign rather than something deep-rooted and long missed.

And maybe it is because of those feelings that Tim says more than he meant too, or maybe it is the tendrils of alcohol obscuring his judgment, or well, it could be both, and it could be neither.

"I miss this," he says to the ceiling, watching shadows shift as a cat walks by the unconcealed window, or maybe that's just the world spinning with Tim's awful life choices. "Us. Being kids. I miss it."

Stephanie hums and shifts to her elbows, the _'clunk'_ of her wine bottle telling Tim that it is emptied and now rolling to the island of his kitchen to be dealt with later. "I do too, sometimes," Steph says, and it doesn't sound like a lie, but it doesn't sound like the whole truth either.

Tim huffs and closes his eyes as the room shifts blurrily around him. "But things have changed," he nearly whispers.

"But things have changed," Stephanie echoes the statement.

And maybe that declaration should make Tim feel something, something more than resigned, but he had already known that fact of life, had for a long time now, so all he feels is the buzz of booze in his head and the soft carpet under his cheek.

Stephanie rolls to the side, and at first, Tim thinks she is turning away from him, but then a moment later he feels the weight of her head settle on the center of his chest. Tim blinks up at the ceiling for an instant, before sighing, long and deep as he places a hesitant hand on Stephanie's ribcage.

"We're gonna be just fine Boy Romeo," Stephanie says from her place on Tim's chest, he can feel the tickle of her breath on his neck and it's thrilling in a way, to think he can have this again, have this trust, this friendship.

It starts drizzling outside, the _'plonk plonk'_ of rain hitting the skylight above them is lulling in a way, a background rhythm that almost matches the compromised hum of Tim's brain.

There is a soft voice in the back of Tim's mind telling him to get up and chug some water so the morning hangover won't be so horrifying, but self-preservation takes a back seat (as it tends to in Tim's case) as Stephanie sighs contently on his chest and Tim's eyelids flutter closed in something akin to happiness.

* * *

They end up sleeping until noon, both nursing horrible headaches and a case of dizziness and irritably. ("I blame _you_ , Brown." "No one _forced_ you to drink, Drake.") But after a few bottles of water, an unhealthy amount of coffee, and some aspirin, the two teenagers were ready to venture outside of Tim's apartment in search of some unjustified and completely undeserved pastries.

Stephanie was still in her ripped jeans and striped sweater, but now she had wrapped one of Tim's blue scarves around her head and stole his red ray bans to fight off the last lingering effects of this morning's hangover.

Which left Tim with the bright Superman sunglasses with the famous S symbol over the lenses, that Jason had 'gifted' him, one of Dick's old Gotham Knights Jerseys, and black jeans that he was pretty sure were a few days past needing washing.

They walked the two blocks to Tim's favorite bakery, grabbed way more pastries than any two people should ever attempt to eat by themselves, and settled at a corner table to watch the rain continue to lazily drizzle outside.

"I think I'm gonna marry this cheese danish," Stephanie hums as she rests her head on the wall next to them, rubbing her cheek over the swirly wallpaper and stuffing her face in a way that should probably be gross, but Tim only finds amusing.

Tim takes a sip of his peppermint coffee and lets his eyes flutter closed for a moment, savoring the feel of warms encompassing his chest, before filling his stomach, leaving him somewhere between sleepy and satisfied. "I am already in a steady and loving relationship with any and _all_ coffee," he mumbles to Stephanie, completely and utterly serious.

The little shop is perfect for a low key and uninterrupted outing, Tim and Stephanie the only patrons, being that it is two in the afternoon on a Thursday. (Don't think about Tam's wrath, _just don't think about it_ ) The music is light in the background, piano and cello harmonizing together in what Tim is 87% sure is an old Taylor Swift song.

Jason won't stop harassing him via text message, says that he feels 'offended' and 'betrayed' that Tim would drink without inviting him. Which in effect means Babs told Dick, and Dick being, well, _himself_ babbled to everyone, which boils down to the fact that next time Tim sees Alfred he will be receiving _The Disapproving_ _Look_ …so there's that to look forward to.

Tim pockets his phone with a text of 'shut your face, I'm hungover' to Jason and an angry middle finger emoji to Dick '🖕' with nothing else attached.

Tim snorts as he feels his phone vibrate in his pocket, choosing to ignore it as Steph glances at him over her stolen sunglasses. "I will _fight_ you for that weird chocolate cake fudge thingy, _I will,"_ she says, taking her fork and going as if to stab the miniature chocolate cake in the middle of the array of many other baked goods crowding their table.

"No way," Tim says as he shoves the cake away, almost pushing the bowl of strawberries off the edge in his haste to protect the cake from Stephanie's oncoming wrath, smiling despite himself.

Stephanie eyes him for a moment, squinting in mock annoyances. "Rock, paper, scissors, for it," she counters, smirking with a glint in her eye as she raises her hands.

Tim huffs, going for exasperated, but it comes out fond even to his own ears. "Fine. Two outta three." It's ridiculous really if either of them actually cared about the little chocolate fudge cake they could walk the ten feet it took to purchase another one, it wasn't as if Tim couldn't afford it.

Tim wins the first, waggling his eyebrows in a way that would do Dick proud. They both throw paper for the second. And Stephanie wins the third with a bright triumphant grin that Tim thinks is probably a better prize that the cake itself.

Tim scrunches his lips, Stephanie wiggles her eyebrows over her sunglasses. "Split it?" she asks smiling, both of them knowing that was how it was going to go down, no matter the outcome of their match.

And that is the photo, front-page, of multiple magazines the very next day, -Stephanie and Tim sitting across from one another, the two looking as if they are hiding from the paparazzi with their shades and the corner table in the small bakery. Tim mid-laugh as Stephanie shoves the fudge cake at his face. - All tabloids contemplating and theorizing _who_ Timothy Drake-Wayne's new love interest is.

And for once Tim doesn't mind being in the public eye all that much.

* * *

 **Who else wants some pastries now?!**

 **Look what I have done...(ლ)**

 **Hope you enjoyed, please let me know your thoughts on this.**

 **(˚▽˚)**

 **Fernandidilly-yo out.**


End file.
